We're still working to get some older smartphone models into our new and improved studio test scene, such as the Nokia Lumia 925 that we recently retested using the new and larger scene.

The new test scene was an especially valuable improvement for our work at Connect. It allows us to better examine the fixed wide-angle lens cameras of smartphones, which could not be as accurately examined using our former smaller test scene. Our newly established protocol for shooting the scene as well as processing the results offers us more accurate real world information about all cameras we test.

We've now put all four of Nokia's newest smartphones, the Lumia 920, 925, 928 and 1020, through our studio scene tests. You can use the image comparison tool below to draw your own conclusions about how the devices perform. As usual you can compare how the phones perform under both bright and low light conditions, either at full resolution, or resized for print or web sharing.

Of course we'll also see how Nokia's newest phablet and tablet, the Lumia 1520 and 2520, stand up to our studio test scene just as soon as we have review units in the office.

That is because the over pixel pitch is smaller than the rest, but there is alot more pixels and hence theoretically more detail. The 1020 was designed for best results when the output image is oversampled to 5Mp. So Connect needs to add in a 5Mp pureview mode to the comparison test to compliment the full resolution image.

I hope they add the Nokia 808 to the new comparison chart, as even though it is an older 2012 phone, it still can capture a descent image

vv50, there are many ways to reduce from a higher MP to a lower MP. Even when using Photoshop, there is multiple options when re-sizing and image. For instance there is Bibubic, Bilinear, and nearest neighbour.

Nokia claims to use an algorithm that will use 7 pixels to make a single "pure" pixel which should have lower noise, better dynamic range, and reduced Bayer effects like moire.

I know the "print" feature on the comparitor is an option for attaining a 5Mp comparison, but it is not necessarily the output you would get from the 808 or 1020 when pureview 5Mp option is selected.

"In addition to a new lighting mode we have also included the option to 'normalize' the scene to a standard print size and social media size. "

That does not mean they actually did separate captures with the Nokia 1020 or 808 with 5mp selected. I believe it means the image has been processed to 5mp, which can be done to any smart phone handset.

I think it is a reasonable guess that the reviewers use the same procedure for all phones as much as they can. If they vary that procedure, they would most likely let readers know about it. So, let’s say they skipped the extra work of making 5mp images in the camera.

Who would that extra work benefit materially? How many people would change their decision about what phone to buy based on seeing the extra images? The closer that number is to zero, the less justification there is to do the extra work.

I know that there are other reasons to test phone cameras … establishing bragging rights, settling forum arguments, etc.

yes VV50, it seems the larger the sensor, the poorer the corner performance especially in the case of iPhone 5 vs 5s.

One exception to that statement is the Nokia 808. It has the largest sensor of all the phones in the comparitor options, and yet has descent corner performance at the most revealing full resolution setting. It may be possible the 808 came out with a better design or higher quality manufactured wide angle optic.

no that's not true, the 808 lens just has a smaller aperture, f2.4 allowing a simpler design compared to the f2.0 of the 920 and f.2.2 of the 1020. sharpness is a design tradeoff on lenses with larger apertures.

the lens of the iphone 5s with f2.2 is better than iphone 5 with f2.4, despite the corners

I am speculating based on what I can see. It is possible that the smaller f2.4 aperture may be assisting the 808 somewhat to getting better corner performance, and it is it the case I would rather sacrifice the approx quarter stop advantage in favor for corner performance.

but you are in the minority of the target market. the most common use case of phone cameras do not include studio shots on tripods, and in real-world usage, sacrificing the corner sharpness for higher shutter speed to reduce shake and for lower gain to reduce noise is a better compromise.

I do not think I am in the minority for wanting to capture landscape style photography in daylight. Also in good lighting situations, faster shutter speeds does not affect picture quality, ie camera shake etc. From the Flickr type shots I see online, the majority of shots are not captured in low light, and the ones that do seem to benefit from xenon flash anyway.

So far the 1020 JPG out of camera output has shown that the sacrifice for camera OIS and size comes with increased grains even at low ISO.

I do not think there is anything wrong with wanting good or improved corner performance, OIS and better picture IQ is there? I do not think it is impossible to achieve.

landscape style photography in daylight is not the target market of these phone cameras.

if you only look at flickr, then that will be your logical conclusion. the phones are also used for video capture that do not benefit from xenon flash.

the sacrifices of the 1020 don't affect the noticeable quality when regularly viewing its photos, they mostly concern those who pixel peep.

there is nothing impossible if there are no constraints. but then 1020 and 808 are different in terms of goals, cost and physical dimensions. no manufacturer would try to achieve what everyone thinks they want but would not return their investment.

"landscape style photography in daylight is not the target market of these phone cameras."

Really? then why bother even having a "full resolution" option available to the user? And for post cropping "zoom reinvented" the better quality the detail, the better the crops will come out.

"if you only look at flickr, then that will be your logical conclusion. the phones are also used for video capture that do not benefit from xenon flash."

I concur OIS is very handy for video recording especially when pureview zoom is used, but again due to the smaller pixel pitch is the 1020's video quality better than the 808?

"the sacrifices of the 1020 don't affect the noticeable quality when regularly viewing its photos, they mostly concern those who pixel peep."

You are correct, for most people viewing photos, they do not pixel peep. That being said once one starts cropping or post "zoom reinvented" cropping. suddenly these irrelevant pixels becomes very much part of the equation.

the 1020 actually does not make it straightforward to get the full resolution image, but nokia did bother to allow the user to get it because it doesn't take anything away from the standard size images that the 1020 can produce.

and yes, used handheld, the video quality of the 1020 is significantly better due to the lack of tremors and larger aperture, and higher bitrate.

as for your zoom/cropping concern, it's just common sense that it will not have the quality of a non-zoomed image, all the nokia literature say so. and that's simply not exclusive to pureview zoom, the same argument can be applied on others like the clear zoom of the xperia z1. but the fact remains that the digital zoom it provides is not interpolated data, unlike other cameras.

vv50 I get the OIS benefits for video but can you please post a link that states that the 1020 has higher bitrate than the 808 for video? Also I have no idea how a larger aperture of a quarter stop can reduce tremors in video recording.

So far I have read that the 1020's audio recording section actually uses a lower bitrate, which has nothing to do with hardware in the 1020 but a limitation of the Windows Phone OS

One has also got to take into account the pixel size. The 1020 has smaller pixels than the 808, so the benefits of larger aperture lower ISO would be close to cancelling out, so the 1020's main advantage will still be OIS, and not aperture.

That link you pointed to me, says nothing with regards to video bitrate? From what I gather the advantages of the 1020 over 808 for video is faster autofocus, optical stabilization, and manual focus.

From real life video comparisons uploaded to Youtube, one cannot compare the video quality as such since youtube re processes video and increases compression. The audio on the other hand can be compared and the 808 has a distinctive ambiance or stereo separation. Not sure why it is different as hardware wise both have identical HAAC mics, but it may be due to position of mics or the way the OS is processing the audio

"so the benefits of larger aperture lower ISO would be close to cancelling out, so the 1020's main advantage will still be OIS, and not aperture." - that's a misconception. the whole reason aperture value is measured in f-stops is so that you don't have to take into consideration other variables of a camera such as the entrance diameter and sensor size.

found the bitrate part, but them how reputable is that site for accuracy and facts. Looking at the camera sensor sizes for both the 1020 and 808 are completely wrong, and the native megapixel is incorrect too for the 808.

That site also says the 1020 has stereo speaker output like that the HTC one has. Is this true?

I was not comparing sensor size, rather I was comparing the signal to noise from having a smaller pixel vs a larger pixel. Regardless of sensor size the BSI output from the 1020 seems ever so slightly more noisy than the larger FSI pixel in the 808. The 1020's slightly larger aperture means it can use a lower ISO, which in turn should cancel out the fact the pixel is noisier to start with.

F stop does not take into consideration the quality of the output image, it only determines a measure of light that covers the sensor.

"808 sucks as a smartphone" - really depends on what you need in a smartphone. where can you get expandable storage, offline car/walk navigation, nfc, fm radio+transmitter, hdmi out, hardware toggle for torch, and dedicated camera shutter built-in in one device? does wp8, android or ios have an app for watching youtube videos offline?

I aggree that the 920 is the best of the bunch (the 1020 is harder to compare because of the higher resolution).But in my eyes the iPhone 5s is clearly better than the 920 - especially looking at the gras and the leaves...

Yes, and I find it unacceptable just how willing dpreview are at completely sweeping this FACT under the table. I'm in Phnom Penh today on a trip and at the NOKIA store here I still saw an advertisement brochure for the Nokia 808 PureView. The 808 is certainly NOT dead at all. Just check out websites like pureviewclub and allaboutsymbian or search flickr, if in doubt.

support for 808 is certainly dead. many online platform integrations such as microsoft exchange calendar, twitter, nokia music (in some countries), and nokia drop are no longer working. not that everyone needed them.

you also commented 2 months ago when Connect first compared the 808 to the 1020 with the new studio test scene, how is it possible that you forgot about it? http://connect.dpreview.com/post/8720896323/pureview-compared-nokia-808-lumia1020-studio-test-scene#comments